Revamp of the Week #4 Guardian

Hello children. Haven't done one of these in while so I thought I'd do one close to home (since the majority of you seem to have this path). While there are other paths that could use a little more help than this one this is a good one to get back into the swing of things. Also in terms of activated abilities/ attacks this tree is a little lacking. Let's get cracking boys!

- I already edited the taunt ability I feel it is an improvement both mechanically and fluffwise. Otherwise the tree is unchanged from its current state. -


Path of the Guardian (29)

Guard - 3 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 1/3/5% block chance.

Parry - 2 Ranks.
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 2/5% block chance against melee attacks.

Deflect - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 2/5% block chance against ranged attacks.

Magic Guard - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Passive - Requires shield -
Effect: You can block projectile spells. If you successfully block a projectile spell it deals 50%/0 damage.

Juggernaut- 3 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Cannot take over 66/50/33% of maximum hp on any single hit.

Iron Skin- 2 Ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails 2
Type: Passive
Effect: Gain +1/2 armor.

Tough as Nails- 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Gain 3/5 additional T for each enemy in the same zone beyond the first. (Max 3 additional enemy)

Adrenaline Rush - 1 Rank
Requirements: Juggernaut 2
Type: Passive Regenerate 1W each round when in the same range as an enemy.

Titan Strike - 3 Ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails 1
Type: Powerful Melee Attack
Effect: You deliver a melee attack using your T for the hit roll. If this attack hits your opponent may not choose to attack anyone except you for the next 1/2/3 rounds. For the duration of this ability all damage that opponent causes you is reduced by 25/33/50%

Hunker Down - 3 Ranks
Requirements: Deflection 2.
Type: Stance - Requires Shield.
Effect: Add a +10/20/30% block chance and +1/2/3 Armor against ranged attacks. You cannot block any melee attacks.

Focused Defense - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Block 2.
Type: Stance - Requires Shield
Effect: Add a +10/20% block chance and 5/10 Ws against a single opponent in melee range. You may not block attacks from any other source.

Taunt - 3 Ranks.
Requirements: None
Type: Powerful Free Medium Ranged Ability
Effect: Make a T vs Wp check with a +0/5/10 bonus. If successful the target can only attack you for the duration of this ability. You can make a T vs Wp check each round to keep the taunt going. Your opponent suffers -0/5/10 to hit and wound against you while taunted.

Blinding Rage - 1 Rank
Requirements: Taunt 1
Type: Passive
Effect: If your taunt ability hits the target cannot use ranged weapons or spells until the effect is over and must move towards you if possible.

I think Focused Defense might be a little too powerful. An additional means it adds up to a 30% to 40% block chance if you've sunk the points into the extra blocks, but even 30% alone is really good. This especially coupled with +10 Ws, which seems odd since it's a defensive tree. Also, is it supposed to require Guard 3 instead of Block 2?

Just thought I'd point out that Ws is used for defensive purposes as well, which is why he chose that.

Really 55% block chance after getting a tower shield, and putting down 7 skill points isn't really that OP, especially when you add in that if you do that you can only block attacks from 1 person. Add in the fact that this doesn't apply to ranged attacks, magic attacks, and there are special abilities which allow you to ignore block chances and it really doesn't seem that powerful to me.

55%? I got up to 40%. Where's the other 15% come from? Other trees? o0

Let's take the 40% for a second, putting the 55% aside, and plug it into the current encounter that myself, Ferret, and Budou are on. If I had Defender, with a Large Shield, I would be flat out ignoring 40% of all incoming attacks from the closest one. No damage, no debuffs, no nothing. 40% flat out percent to just not take damage from any of them that I choose since there are no ranged attackers nor are there casters. Imagine if any of these were a melee boss. Even if he had 10% Block ignore, I still have a 30% chance to take zero damage from that boss' hit.

That's too powerful for one ability, in my opinion.

40% is probably too high for 7 points - 55% definitely is, imo. Especially since once people get better (magical) shields, that number will go up significantly.

Sorry about that, 40% is correct. For some reason I was making each level of Guard add 5%. Yeah blocking 40% of attacks outright might seem a bit OP if we're talking single enemy encounters, but how often do those happen? Almost all of the encounters we've had have had more enemies than players and most have had a mix of melee, ranged, and magical opponents. The only encounter we've had with one enemy (aside from my very first fight) was against a Dragon Ogre and it had a magic attack.

Seriously, all boss enemies that we will face will have some way to deal with this since they'll be designed to fight somewhere between 2 and 7 enemies at once. It's going to be rare that they just melee a single opponent, especially when that opponent is the obvious tank. Add in skills and magical items that let them ignore block chances and I don't really see having a 40% guard chance as OP.

You should also take into account what someone who uses these 7 skill points is giving up in terms of raw damage output and the like. With 7 skill points in the Tzeentch tree I could have Red Fire 3, Red Blade 2, and 1 point in Indignant Rage and Warrior Wizard. Red Blade has the capability to kill most enemies we've fought so far in one hit by itself. Remember that killing an enemy does a lot more than just avoiding a hit. Our last adventure adds a great example. If I had been able to dodge 40% of the physical attacks aimed at me would it have made a major difference? How about if I had been able to deal 7-19 (red fire's 4-13 + basic handweapon's 3-6) damage in one hit? Taking out that obelisk in a single round would have done a lot more.

Obviously with shields better than tower shields we could run into problems where Guardian users become very hard to hit in melee, but the person running the encounter can easily add more enemies to remedy this, since it only works on one person at a time.

Honestly the one target limitation makes me almost never want to use focused defense over hunker down outside of single enemy boss encounters which is when I should be using the skill in the first place.

I know that Pony's played the Gameboy Final Fantasy game that was actually one of the Saga titles originally. In it you could choose different races for your party and each had their own gimmick. Humans were average, but weapons had a limited number of uses, so they could run out of attacks in a dungeon or in a boss fight. Mutants had some weird stat upgrade thing, but used weapons like humans. Meanwhile monsters had an unlimited number of attacks, but their stat growth was designed to make them like actual monsters in the game (high HP and defense values but relatively weak attacks). The idea being that monsters could just keep fighting and fighting and eventually wear down their enemies. This didn't work well with the random encounters though, where monsters would do so little damage fighting essentially themselves, that they would come out a lot more damaged then humans or mutants would (I think there was a fourth race as well, but I can't remember). By the time the monsters would get to a boss, they were too damaged to live long enough to wear down the boss. Since we've mainly been using multiple encounter adventures here the same rules tend to apply. Killing an opponent quickly is more important than wearing them down.

Sorry about the wall of text, but currently there is a reason why I'm bee-lining towards deadly poison as a super tank based character.

Enemy strategic intelligence is also a relevant concern here. While it's true that most of our encounters involve multiple enemies, those enemies also usually spread their attacks out. It is unusual for more than one enemy to be attacking a given character at one time. Now, if our moves are transparent to the enemy and they act in a tactically sound matter, the one targeted by Focused Defense would immediately switch targets with another enemy, making it useless. If not, targeting your current melee target with Focused Defense is extraordinarily powerful, since it not only prevents a large portion of attacks from (likely) your only current attacker, it buffs your chance to hit them as well. By the same token, if you're using Focused Defense on a dragon ogre and it wants to hurt you, does it know that it's a bad idea to swing at you, and a good idea to use a magic attack? (Assuming you don't have Magic Guard, in which case even magic attacks are just as likely to fail)

That said, I don't think the current block chance of Focused Defense is a problem. The WS bonus on top of the massive block chance, however, I think is overkill for 2 points.

Edit: Also, Red Blade seems really good until you remember that IT NEVER FUCKING HITS ASJDKHAKEFHSXCRAGEQUIT

So far most of the enemies we've encountered have been melee enemies or spent most of their turns doing something melee-orientated though. I wasn't pointing a finger simply at single-monster/NPC encounters, I was pointing a finger at enemies that do nothing but melee attack. I'll give you the Dragon Ogre, though for the record he only used said spell attack twice out of his four or five turns. However, in return for the Dragon Ogre, I give you the Undead Kroxigor from Adventure #1: "Diving Into The Unknown" who indeed did nothing but attack us with his weapon/claws/basic attacks.

Hunker Down might be an issue too-- except you lose your ability to block melee when you do it. Not to mention once you close to melee range a ranged attacker stops attacking with his ranged attacks anyway. It is much more limited in it's usefulness then Focused Defense which is useful any time you have a melee bruiser in your face of any type, be it boss beastie or just an angry marauder with a pair of swords. Hunker Down is far more situational then Focused Defense, especially since you're unlikely to see a situation where giving up 100% of your ability to block melee attacks for some ranged defense is a wise decision. Will they exist? Certainly. Will they also be rarer then occasions where you'd like to block 40% of a single guy's attacks? I think they are, yes.

If Block weren't an automatic "You don't hurt me" percentage, this might be a different conversation but I just feel like a 40% chance to simply not take damage from a melee attacker is too much.

Side Note: I don't mind the walls of text Chair, I practically ran an online forum RPG for two and something years so I'm used to the walls of text. If I miss a point that you thought was particularly important, feel free to say something and I'll try and address it more clearly.

Edit: Took out portion regarding Focused Defense vs Red Blade, may re-address later when brain works better.

Curse my selective memory! i completely forgot about the undead Kroxigor. I agree that completely nullifying 40% of attacks is a bit absurd and that most of the enemies we've fought have been melee based. However, I feel that the fact that the block only works against 1 enemy at a time, and you can only choose the enemy on your turn, is a sufficient weakness. Perhaps if it left your block rate (minus the bonus from Focused Defense) for everyone else I would be worried about balance, but it doesn't. No matter how high your block chance is against a single enemy, you still lose the ability to block attacks from any other source.

As for melee bosses, perhaps we could just assign bosses the ability to ignore block chance, or they cut it by half or something.

Wow. This is an impressive thread. I agree focused defense needs to be changed. At a minimum I'll remove the +Ws. The idea as I recall back to my thinking several months ago was that even though its a defensive tree if you are focusing all your energy on a single target you should get a bonus to attack (Similar to infinite hatred but more defense focused.)

I was certainly not expecting a giant thread on the philosophy of my monsters in combat. As to why they don't focus fire. Should they be smart enough too? Absolutely. But I am not a massive dick. It would not be a fun experience if three dudes run into a room fighting 3 monsters and the combat goes as follows.

Monsters 1-3 Attack Adventurer 1 - Dead
Adventurers 2-2 Attack Monster 1 - Dead
Monseters 2-3 Attack Adventurer 2 - Dead. You get the point.

Is focusing fire tactical? Yes. Fun? Not usually.

And don't worry about bosses. They scale to the party, and the majority of large bosses will either possess multiple attacks, or AoEs.

So back to the tree at hand?

How do we folks feel about more actives for the tree in particular. There are plenty of blocking and defensive passives.

Here is one I've been toying with.

Brace for Impact - 2 Ranks
Requirements: ?
Type: Personal Ability
Effect: Gain +3/5 T. This bonus fades by half each turn you don't use this ability.

Not bad, it's like that strength raising one. Seems a little more difficult to fluff up but not impossible. I think removing the Ws bonus to Focused Defense is a good idea as well.

Derailing a little bit, I think that enemies should try to match the intelligence of the creatures involved. Animals attack wildly, barbarians just kind of rage, while an elite squad might focus on squishy targets or something. Maybe make leader type enemies that we could target to get them back towards their disorganized attacks? Having said that, fun should always be the focus, and it's not terribly fun to get killed during an adventure, so just having everybody rampage on the squishiest person would clearly suck, so all of this should be taken with a grain of salt.

As for actives, I feel there should be some more, just to get the tree a bit more equal to the others, but I have a feeling that the Guardian Tree is going to end up with a larger percentage of passives anyways, which I'm fine with. I'll try and come up with some abilities and powerful abilities this weekend, but my first priority is going to be getting my friend's character finished up tomorrow so we can have a Skaven who will actually post.

Clearly focus fire would not be fun, because the players would lose horribly. Acting intelligently to avoid the full strength of player abilities (like Focused Defense) is sort of a gray area. I do like the idea of killing a leader or something to reduce their tactical intelligence, especially since that creature is likely to be a buffer/healer that we would want to kill first anyway.

Anyway, thoughts:
Titan Strike requires a bit of clarification: Can the target ONLY attack you, or does it have to just include you in its attacks (I'm thinking of AOEs)?

New ability ideas:

Shield Wall - 2 ranks
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: Until the beginning of your next turn, you gain 1/2 armor and 10/20% block chance.

Last Stand - 2 ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails 2
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: You gain DR equal to 20%/40% of your max Wounds, lasting for 1/2 rounds.

Avoidance - 2 ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: As long as you are using a shield, you take 25%/50% less damage from AOE attacks (define that however you please - I would have said "attacks that hit more than one player", but there are obvious exceptions like Cleave that I don't think should fall under this ability).

Here are some abilities for it. Used Ferrets ideas as a springboard for Last Stand and combined the old FD with shield wall.

Last Stand - 2 ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails 2
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: Lose 10% of your maximum W. You gain DR 3/5 for each W you lose. This lasts for 3 rounds.

Shield Bash - 2 ranks
Requirements: Parry 2
Type: Powerful Melee Attack (Requires Shield)
Effect: This attack deals 3-6 damage instead of your normal weapon damage. Add 1/2 to the hit and wound roll of this attack for each % block chance your shield offers. In addition this attack wounds that foe suffers -1/2 to hit and wound for each % block chance your shield offers.

Redone FD-
Focused Defense - 2 ranks
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: You gain +10/20% block chance and +1/2 armor against a single foe until the start of your next turn. Your block chance against all other foes is reduced to zero. You also gain +5/10 to hit that foe on your next turn. If you block an attack from your targeted enemy double this bonus.

Battlefield Terror - 2 ranks
Requirements: Taunt 3
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: All foes in your zone are treated as "Engaged". In addition they suffer a -5/-10 penalty to all rolls. If this roll does not target you, double this penalty.

Battlefield Terror - 2 ranks
Requirements: Taunt
Type: Powerful Melee Ability
Effect: All foes in your zone are treated as "Engaged". In addition they suffer a -5/-10 to all rolls. Double this penalty if the action does not include you in its target.

I'm getting a little engrish vibe here, what exactly causes the penalty to be doubled?

Other stuff looks good though.

Description edited. Hopefully it makes more sense now.

FlyingPinkPony wrote:
Focused Defense - 2 ranks
Requirements: Guard 3
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: You gain +10/20% block chance and +1/2 armor against a single foe until the start of your next turn. Your block chance against all other foes is reduced to zero. You also gain +5/10 to hit that foe on your next turn. If you block an attack from your targeted enemy double this bonus.

As a Powerful, one turn ability, I don't think this needs the "no blocking anyone else" disadvantage anymore.

Also, I changed the requirement on Battlefield Terror from "Taunt" to "Taunt 3", which I imagine is what you meant. And wtf does "Powerful Melee Ability" mean? It's not an Attack, but it's Melee? Is it free? Is it an action? Clearly it only affects people in your zone, yes, but does that make it "Melee" if it's not an attack?

It's a powerful melee range ability. You can only do it to foes in melee range. Honestly I don't think the distinction really has to be made since the description already includes the range of the ability, but maybe Pony has some further plans that would require this distinction (like a skill that resets all melee range powerful abilities or something).

Alright so trying to come up with some better names for Battlefield Terror I came up with the following:

Lockdown
Unavoidable Challenge
Roaring Challenge
None Shall Pass
Pull a Zhang Fei
Guard the Way/Pass
Guardian's Challenge
Overwhelming Presence

Since it's an advanced taunt skill I feel it should have some sort of challenge or taunt aspect to the title, and as an ability it should have more of a verbal force (I feel that one should be able to shout an abilities name when used without it sounding out of place). Obviously none of these really hit the mark, but hopefully we can brainstorm some more ideas together.

As for other abilities here are some ideas:

Shield Wall (placeholder name) - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Guard 3 or Tough as Nails 2
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: For 2/3 rounds no enemy may move past you (i.e. if they start on the right of you they may not move to the left and vice versa).

-Very similar to Battlefield Terror, but I really like giving Guardian's the ability to actually keep enemies from getting to or striking their allies.

Giant Target (absolutely terrible name) - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Hunker Down 3 (
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: For 1/2 rounds all enemies that make a ranged attack must target you, gaining +10/5 to hit while losing -5/10 to wound.

-A way to get ranged attackers to target you when you use the Hunker Down stance seems useful to me, though I do't know how broken this could end up being.

Unequivocal Defense - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Iron Skin 2 (?)
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: For 1/2 rounds double your armor, DR, and block chance, you may not attack.

-For when you really gotta tank hard. Possibly very broken, thus the no attacking, but really I'm just trying to toss out ideas before I think about balancing them.

That's all I got for the moment.

Yeah, the range thing is a non-issue unless more rules get created that affect it. What kind of action it is, however, is still a key question.

I like your Shield Wall idea. Rather than just make it "can't move past", though, what if it was "can't move out of your zone"? Keeps the enemy from moving through you, but also keeps them in melee range of you, which is an excellent taunt-y type ability.

I just wanted to not step so much on the same territory as Battlefield Terror really.

That's true, I hadn't considered that.

I like Unavoidable Challenge for BT's name. I'll use that for the time being.

Shield wall overlaps too much with that ability.

Unequivocal Defense- A tad boring imho since you can't attack but if we really want an uber invuln for a round skill. Also the doubling mechanic doesn't really scale very well. Lastly Unequivocal is a really long word. Especially for a tanking character. Should be more of a loud grunt. Like "Ugh". Has a good ring to it. Lastly since its not free you don't need to worry about the not attacking clause.

Unequivocal Defense - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Iron Skin 2, Block 3
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: You gain +10/20% to both your dodge and block chance and DR 7/15 until the start of your next turn.


<Giant Target>
Cover - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Deflect 2
Type: Powerful Stance Ability
Effect: Any enemy that chooses to make a ranged attack against your ally that is either further away or the same distance away must target you instead. Enemies gain +5/10 to hit you with ranged attacks. You also gain +5/10T against ranged attacks. This ability lasts until the start of your next turn. You cannot move while Covering.

*Tossed in T to make it more appealing. You should also take a little less damage imo.*

I think URRGGHH Defense is a good name for that ability.

I know, I'm brilliant. Credit the gold to my account.

I don't know, the Oof Defense seems a little more charming to me.

On topic, all of those changes seem good to me, and I agree Unequivocal is a bit too long and scholarly.

Path of the Guardian - Revamped Wikki wikki wow... (42 points)

Guard - 3 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 1/3/5% block chance.

Parry - 2 Ranks.
Requirements: Guard
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 2/5% block chance against melee attacks.

Deflect - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Guard
Type: Passive
Effect: Grants a 2/5% block chance against ranged attacks.

Shrapnel - 1 Rank
Requirements: Deflect
Type: Passive
Effect: Whenever you block a ranged attack or spell all enemies in your zone suffer half the base weapon or spell damage.

Magic Guard - 2 Ranks
Requirements: Guard
Type: Passive - Requires shield -
Effect: You can block projectile spells. If you successfully block a projectile spell it deals 66/33% damage from that attack instead of full.

Adrenaline Rush - 1 Rank
Requirements: Titan
Type: Passive
Effect: Regenerate 1W each time you engage an enemy.

Tough as Nails- 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Gain 3/5 additional T for each enemy either engaging you or being engaged by you, beyond the first. (Max 5 stacks)

Shield Bash - 3 ranks
Requirements: Parry
Type: Powerful Melee Attack (Requires Shield)
Effect: This attack deals 3-6/4-8/5-10 damage instead of your normal weapon damage. Add 1/2/3 to the hit and wound roll of this attack for each % block chance your shield offers. In addition this attack wounds that foe suffers -1/2/3 to hit and wound for each % block chance your shield offers on their next turn.

Focused Defense - 3 ranks
Requirements: Guard
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: You gain +10/20/30% block chance and +1/2/3 armor against a single foe until the start of your next turn. Your block chance against all other foes is reduced to zero. You also gain +5/10/15 to hit that foe on your next turn.

Last Stand - 2 ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails 2
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: Lose 10% of your maximum W. You gain DR 3/5 for each W you lose. This DR lasts for 3 rounds.

Titan- 3 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: You cannot take over 66/50/33% of your maximum hp on any single hit. Any damage that deals more than this amount deals this amount instead.

Lockdown - 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Powerful Free Ability
Effect: Enemies currently engaged by you cannot take any action that would disengage them or engage another target. This is usable 1/2 times an encounter.

Battlefield Terror - 2 ranks
Requirements: Tough as Nails
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: You engage all foes in your zone. In addition they suffer a -10/20 penalty to all rolls for the next round.

Guarded Strike - 3 Ranks
Requirements:
Type: Powerful Melee Attack
Effect: You deliver a melee attack using your T for the hit roll. A foe struck by this attack deals 50% weapon damage to you for the next 1/2/3 rounds.

Taunt - 3 Ranks.
Requirements: None
Type: Powerful Melee Ability
Effect: Make a T vs Wp check against a foe within medium range. If successful the target can only perform actions that move them closer to you or target you for the next 1/2/3 rounds.

Blinding Rage - 1 Rank
Requirements: Taunt
Type: Passive
Effect: A target affected by your taunt ability cannot use Ranged Attacks or Ranged Abilities against you.

Large Target - 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Passive
Effect: Any foe attempted to use a ranged attack or spell against an ally without the Large Target ability, while you are in between or in the allies zone suffers -5/10 to hit and cast. (Needs rewording but you get the idea)

Shield Wall - 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Powerful Free Ability - Requires Shield
Effect: All allies in your zone gain a block chance equal to 1/2 times your shields block value for 1 round.

Unequivocal Defense - 2 Ranks
Requirements: None
Type: Powerful Ability
Effect: You gain +1/2 armor, +10/20% block chance, and DR 5/10 for 1 round.

Highlander - 1 Rank
Requirements: Lots
Type: Epic Ability
Effect: You do not die as a result of having less than 0 wounds and gain DR equal to half your max W. You gain a bonus to hit and wound equal to your current DR value and 1 bonus damage to melee attacks for every 5 points of DR you possess. These effects last for 3 rounds.

Shoot little kids. We get this one good to go and the magic trees beta-able and we'll be able to play. And once we play we'll be able to invite more folks in.